This invention relates to a money handling apparatus such as a note depositing/dispensing apparatus installed mainly at a supermarket or a retail store such as a specialty store.
Cash registers are installed at supermarkets and retail stores such as specialty stores, and customers having purchased goods or commodities are generally served one by one for payment by these cash registers. Due to an insufficient capacity of the cash registers and for the security purpose, money handling apparatuses such as note depositing/dispensing apparatuses electrically connected with the cash registers are frequently installed separately from the cash registers. The note depositing/dispensing apparatuses are adapted to deposit and dispense notes having a denomination of $1 or larger and used to pay out changes for large denomination notes and to exchange. Particularly, since large denomination notes such as $100-note are not used as a change, they are normally deposited immediately after being received from customers.
Such a depositing/dispensing apparatus is provided with an inserting section on which notes to be inserted into the depositing/dispensing apparatus are placed, an introducing section for introducing the notes placed on the inserting section one by one, a discriminating section for discriminating the types and genuineness of notes introduced by the introducing section, a sorting section for sorting the notes based on the discrimination result of the discriminating section, a storing section for separately storing the sorted notes, and a conveying section for conveying the notes from an upstream side to a downstream side inside the depositing/dispensing apparatus.
The respective sections are placed on a movable table insertably and withdrawably mounted in a casing. This movable table is normally accommodated in the casing, but is drawn from the casing upon an occurrence of a note jam and during maintenance to remove the jammed note and inspect the respective sections exposed to the outside.
With the conventional note depositing/dispensing apparatus, when, for example, a note jam occurs, the movable table is entirely drawn from the casing, and a position of jamming is searched with all the interior mechanisms exposed. This causes a security problem.
Even if an operator succeeds in searching the position of jamming and removing the jammed note, it is frequently unclear whether the inserted note has been already counted or not. Specifically, the inserted note may be put into the storing section if having been already counted, whereas it may be inserted through the inserting section unless otherwise. However, if it is not clear whether the inserted note has been already counted or not, the removed note cannot be properly handled.
Usually, a register operator or cashier cannot judge how he/she should handle the note removed from the position of jamming. In the end, he/she has to ask for a help from an administrator of the store. Since an operation is interrupted at the cashier, this causes much trouble to customers and causes a reduced operation efficiency.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a money handling apparatus which is free of the above problems residing in the prior art.
According to an aspect of the invention, a money handling apparatus is provided with a casing and a movable table insertably and withdrawably mounted in the casing. A note handling mechanism is mounted on the movable table for performing deposition of notes. The note handling mechanism includes: a first mechanism provided at a front side of the movable table with respect to a drawing direction for transferring a note rearward at the time of depositing, and a second mechanism provided at a rear side of the movable table with respect to the drawing direction for permitting the deposited note to be stored. There are provided a restricting device for restricting the drawing movement of the movable table from the casing to a first drawing position where only the first mechanism is exposed to the outside, and a restriction controller for releasing the restriction of the restricting device so as to enable the movable table to be drawn up to a second drawing position where the second mechanism is exposed to the outside.
These and other objects, features and advantages of the present invention will become more apparent upon a reading of the following detailed description and accompanying drawings.